…and the house he shares with his people.

Kitchen cabinets part III: Paint color (again)

Having decided that my cabinets were far too light, I took a trip down the paint chip. Chatroom, one step darker, had been a front runner all along. But looking at how minty the cabinets came out, I was afraid it wasn’t different enough. So off I marched to Sherwin Williams for “Hardware” – the darkest pictured:It was, to say the least, an unsuccessful venture:

Top cabinets: Hardware; Lower cabinets: Techno Gray

Looking at the photo, I’m partly surprised by the fact that it looks more or less fine to me. It didn’t in person. It actually went really well with the backsplash tile, I just wasn’t prepared for it to be green, which in person, it was. I wanted my cabinets to be gray, albeit with green undertones. It’s definitely MUCH darker than the first attempt, still on the bottom cabinets (I never got any further with the dark paint than pictured), but I couldn’t shake the feeling that a MASH unit should pull up any minute.

So I thought, and I pondered. One is too light… one is too dark…

AHA!

That’s a good 7/8 gallon of Techno Gray, maybe 15/16 of a gallon of Hardware, resulting in a close approximation to Chatroom, which I’d been entertaining, and should probably have chosen all along. Slap it on the cabinets and call me convinced, I finally love it:

For comparison, all 3 shades in one picture – and probably one of the truest to real life color:

Admittedly, I'm not as brazen as I sound, just tossing 2 gallons of paint together... I tested a mixture in a plastic cup and painted a door as a trial run first!

The combined color isn’t as olive green as the darkest version, or as minty green as the lightest version. It’s a mid gray-green, which I was going for all along – coordinates with the backsplash, looks good with stainless steel appliances, without starting to make the kitchen feel cave-like.

I don’t actually have much more painted than the last post, but I feel like I’ve made progress! (Additionally, the fronts & backs of all 27 doors + drawer faces are primed – so I’m completely done with the primer phase. Yay!)

Resources like the one you mentioned here will be very useful to me!This is what makes the web so great. We can find so much info on things we like. thanks a lot for sharing 🙂
Regards,
Sy “Kitchen Improvements“Reza